


Will You Stand Above Me?

by Other_Pens



Category: The London Life (Roleplaying Game)
Genre: Angst, Class Differences, Class Issues, Other, Regency
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-06
Updated: 2016-09-06
Packaged: 2018-08-13 11:06:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7974565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Other_Pens/pseuds/Other_Pens
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Response to prompt for "...something formative for 1811 Teddy?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Will You Stand Above Me?

_December, 1809_  
  
  
In the breath between dances, Theodore had been called upon to attend his cousin Charlotte, who had turned her ankle in the last set, and was now less injured in her person than her pride, and had all the indignant self-pity of a girl of fifteen who has been obliged to sit down for the rest of the evening at a Christmas ball, where no one under the age of sixty has any desire to sit down at length and no one over the age if sixty the ability to talk of anything amusing to said girl.  
  
Teddy felt all the sympathy possible for her situation, and did not begrudge taking the time to find her a seat from which she might have an excellent view of the dance, while being slightly obscured by the fall of a curtain across the alcove, to give some dignity to the bare foot that was now propped inelegantly upon another chair just opposite.  
  
"--and Mr. Sedgewell did promise he would dance with all of us, he promised he would! I think he meant to include me in his promise as much as he did Eliza or Nelly." She sniffled, and Teddy found his pocket handkerchief and handed it to the red-eyed girl, who still had a few tears trickling down her cheeks.  
  
"Then you may hold him to his promise another time, I am sure," he said. "And how many young ladies have their own doctor--well, their own gallant medical student, that is to say--to attend them when they twist an ankle, eh?"  
  
He cleared his throat lightly and adjusted his cuffs before proceeding to gently probe the bone.  
  
"It is not broken, Lottie," he pronounced solemnly, with a nod.  
  
"Honestly, Teddy, I did not need you to tell me so. Do you think I'd be weeping for Mr. Sedgewell if I had a broken ankle?"  
  
Teddy's lips twitched and he had to smile at his cousin.  
  
"No, I suppose not. You're a good and sensible girl, Lottie. Mr. Sedgewell will surely dance with you some day."  
  
"Who was it you were dancing with, in the last? I could not see, exactly." Charlotte, barred from dancing, now seemed determine to at least take stock of every one else's experience.  
  
"A Miss Gillingham--her father is a friend of--"  
  
"Father's, oh yes, I remember her, now. They came to call some time ago. She was very ill-mannered when she thought anyone's mamma or papa were not watching..."  
  
"Perhaps she has improved her manners. I thought she was very agreeable."  
  
"Will you ask her to dance another?"  
  
Teddy's ears turned very red, but he shrugged.  
  
"Perhaps. Perhaps not."  
  
"She is very pretty, I'll allow, and that dress is quite becoming, for all she had it made up so plainly. Not many can carry off a white muslin with so little embellishment, and it must be quite cold for this time of year, but she manages quite well, and with that one lock of her hair about her shoulders, she is the picture of a young nymph or goddess," was Charlotte's pronouncement. Theodore listened in silence, neither agreeing not disagreeing, but it was plain to see that Miss Gillingham was the beauty of the evening, and she did not lack for partners and admiring glances.  
  
"She looks very well, and spoke well, when we danced. She was very amiable."  
  
"It is early--you might beg another dance with her yet...look, the set has ended and she is coming to this side of the room..."  
  
"Perhaps..." As Theodore made no move from the alcove, Lottie prodded him in the ribs with her fan. "Ow!"  
  
"Faint heart never won fair squire's daughter."  
  
"As my Lottie commands," muttered Theodore with a small grin, playfully tweaking one of the girl's ringlets. He straightened his coat and touched his cravat, spying Miss Gillingham as she drew nearer, her face alight with enjoyment, and pleasingly flushed from the dancing. Her sweet voice was still too low to be distinct among the chatter of the ballroom, but Teddy caught its gentle tones as she spoke to her companion; and as both girls broke into laughter, Miss Gillingham's was as silver and gold were to pewter and brass.  
  
He glanced at Lottie, who grinned, and paused, searching for the moment he might politely interrupt their conversation with his request.  
  
"...and, well, that was that, my dear," said Miss Gillingham, with a toss of her golden head, an empress in her manner at seventeen.  
  
"But who was it you danced with before? The quiet one?"  
  
"Quiet? Oh, you mean Mr. Meredith, I suppose. Quiet, I'd hardly call him...I could scarcely get a word in, I just gave a yes and a no and made whatever sympathetic sounds seemed necessary. He just went on and on about his being a doctor...and yet I'll swear to it he must only be at university, yet. I suppose he wanted me to think him older than he is."  
  
Teddy had gone still upon hearing his name spoken, but it took only a few more words for him to draw back behind the curtain, unseen. Miss Gillingham and her crony stood together, fanning themselves while Theodore burned with indignation. He had mentioned his studies, once, and never had he made more of them than they were, nor claimed to be a doctor. He had generally been content to let Miss Gillingham make her arch and witty observations, at length, throughout the dance.  
  
"Meredith? I suppose he is Sir Evelyn's younger son, then," said her friend, nodding knowingly. A younger son, in a profession, was hardly a catch worthy of the glorious Miss Gillingham.  
  
"Heavens, no, child!" exclaimed the fair Gillingham. "If that were only the worst of it! He is the natural son of some younger sister of Sir Evelyn. A tragic story, though the family act as if it never happened."  
  
Teddy's lips formed a thin line. In providing him a home, an education, and some measure of affection, the Merediths had lost some social clout, to some degree. Teddy was not flaunted before society, however, and their lives in Wales were quiet enough that snubs were more carefully dispensed than perhaps they were in higher circles. Miss Gillingham had had a season in London--her manners no doubt expected more of these barbaric Welshmen--but Teddy had never presumed for a moment that his position or his mother were forgotten, by his family or anyone else. Forgiven, perhaps, in a manner Miss Gillingham was not prepared to counter.  
  
"It is very shocking, I dare say--whatever made you stand up with him?"  
  
"Well, for one, Papa is safely in the card room--and you are never to breathe a word of it to him--and, goodness, when I think of what went on in London--the things I could tell you, Pamela! Dancing with some back-water bastard would hardly make me blush, after what I've seen!"  
  
And how much of that, Teddy wondered, would be more of the invention of which Miss Gillingham was so fond?  
  
"And for another, I am determined not to let Mr. Meredith--as I suppose we must call him, as he has no claim to any better name than his poor ruined mother's--I am determined not to let him ruin my night, for if I refused him I should only be obliged to refuse everybody. I've heard Lord Connyngham will be here, tonight. I mean to enchant him...and I can much more easily do that when he asks me to dance. This muslin does nothing for me when I am sitting down--I must be in motion--the lights will shine through it. A turn beneath his arm for a line, and a smile for a hook!"  
  
The girls laughed again.  
  
"I dare say you will land him, then."  
  
"So you see, I must throw the bastard back, and bait my hook again!" The pair tittered afresh at this witticism, and then a general murmur arose. "Pamela! Lord Connyngham! Fix my sash, would you, dear?"  
  
There was a flurry of pinched cheeks and adjusted necklines, and the girls were pressing single-mindedly through the crowd to make their curtsies to the earl.  
  
Theodore found himself sitting on the edge of the chair allocated to Lottie's poor foot. He glanced at his cousin, caught her pitying look, and shrugged gamely, with a small smile.  
  
"Teddy..."  
  
"She said nothing for me to mind, Lottie. Little enough was true, and of what was, I know already. Why should it bother me now?"  
  
"But you liked her..."  
  
"I did. And now I like her no longer. I was taken in by a pretty face and pretty words--for all of half an hour. I am not breaking my heart over Miss Gillingham, and I should be sorry if I were. She has shown herself for what she is."  
  
"Will you cut her, now?" Lottie still had an infantile thirst for revenge, when she thought it justified, however tempered by social awareness her more violent urges of righteousness might be.  
  
"I doubt a cut from me would hurt her any more than a snub from a snake."  
  
"I'll never let Papa invite them to anything, ever again," said Lottie with savage relish.  
  
"Your father may invite who he chooses to his house--when you have your own house, you may neglect to invite Lady Connyngham to your heart's content."  
  
"Do you really think she will manage to marry the earl?"  
  
"She has nothing to prevent her," said Teddy.  
  
"Except being horrid and a liar."  
  
"That, my little Lottie, unfortunately doesn't prevent a great deal, I think," said Teddy with a sigh as he stood. "Now I'm going to go get you an ice, and see if I can't steal a pack of cards for us to play with."  
  
"Are you not going to dance, anymore?"  
  
Theodore shook his head.  
  
"Not tonight, Lottie. Not tonight."


End file.
